Design and development of referrals automation, a SMART on FHIR solution to improve patient access to specialty care

Disparities in Access to Deep Brain Stimulation for Parkinson's Disease and Proposed Interventions: A Literature Review

BACKGROUND

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is an effective therapy for Parkinson's disease (PD), but disparities exist in access to DBS along gender, racial, and socioeconomic lines.

SUMMARY

Women are underrepresented in clinical trials and less likely to undergo DBS compared to their male counterparts. Racial and ethnic minorities are also less likely to undergo DBS procedures, even when controlling for disease severity and other demographic factors. These disparities can have significant impacts on patients' access to care, quality of life, and ability to manage their debilitating movement disorders.

KEY MESSAGES

Addressing these disparities requires increasing patient awareness and education, minimizing barriers to equitable access, and implementing diversity and inclusion initiatives within the healthcare system. In this systematic review, we first review literature discussing gender, racial, and socioeconomic disparities in DBS access and then propose several patient, provider, community, and national-level interventions to improve DBS access for all populations.

Considerations in implementation of social risk factor screening and referral in maternal and infant care in Washington, DC: A qualitative study

BACKGROUND

The District of Columbia (DC) has striking disparities in maternal and infant outcomes comparing Black to White women and babies. Social determinants of health (SDoH) are widely recognized as a significant contributor to these disparities in health outcomes. Screening for social risk factors and referral for appropriate services is a critical step in addressing social needs and reducing outcome disparities.

METHODS

We conducted interviews among employees (n = 18) and patients (n = 9) across three diverse, urban clinics within a healthcare system and one community-based organization involved in a five-year initiative to reduce maternal and infant disparities in DC. Interviews were guided by the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research to understand current processes and organizational factors that contributed to or impeded delivery of social risk factor screening and referral for indicated needs.

RESULTS

We found that current processes for social risk factor screening and referral differed between and within clinics depending on the patient population. Key facilitators of successful screening included a supportive organizational culture and adaptability of more patient-centered screening processes. Key barriers to delivery included high patient volume and limited electronic health record capabilities to record results and track the status of internal and community referrals. Areas identified for improvement included additional social risk factor assessment training for new providers, patient-centered approaches to screening, improved tracking processes, and facilitation of connections to social services within clinical settings.

CONCLUSION

Despite proliferation of social risk factor screeners and recognition of their importance within health care settings, few studies detail implementation processes for social risk factor screening and referrals. Future studies should test implementation strategies for screening and referral services to address identified barriers to implementation.

Implementation of a Post-Encounter Telephone Call at a Student-Run Free Clinic to Promote Preventive Medicine and Early Clinical Education

The goals of this study were to determine the completion rates of patient order forms at the Cooper Rowan Clinic, a student-run free clinic, and to implement the use of a post-encounter phone call to improve completion rates, preventive medicine, and medical student clinical involvement. 151 patients completed a pre-intervention questionnaire before their visit. The questionnaire collected information regarding successfully completed order forms. First-year students were trained to perform phone calls and called their patients for five months. 205 patients then completed a post-intervention questionnaire. Dependent variables included completion rates for laboratory studies, specialty referrals, imaging studies and miscellaneous tests. Chi-squared tests were performed. Although the completion rates for laboratory testing (pre = 73.7% vs post = 81.1%), referrals (pre = 50.0% vs post = 65.1%) and imaging studies (pre = 60.9% vs post = 71.7%) increased, the results were not statistically significant. The completion rate of miscellaneous testing (pre = 41.7% vs post = 100.0%) increased following the implementation and was statistically significant. When patients were stratified to those who received a phone call, completion rates of referrals (73.0%), laboratory testing (86.1%), imaging studies (80.5%), and miscellaneous studies (100.0%) substantially increased. Although not statistically significant except for miscellaneous studies, there was an overall increase in completion in all categories. Further evidence to suggest that phone calls improved order completion was the substantial increase in completion rates in patients who received a call. The implementation improves completion of orders which could enhance preventive measures within the clinic. Additionally, it provides an opportunity for earlier student clinical exposure through direct patient contact.

Standardizing Primary Health Care Referral Data Sets in Nigeria: Practitioners' Survey, Form Reviews, and Profiling of Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR)

Background

Referral linkages are crucial for efficient functioning of primary health care (PHC) systems. Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resource (FHIR) is an open global standard that facilitates structuring of health information for coordinated exchange among stakeholders.

Objective

The objective of this study is to design FHIR profiles and present methodology and the profiled FHIR resource for Maternal and Child Health referral use cases in Ebonyi state, Nigeria—a typical low- and middle-income country (LMIC) setting.

Methods

Practicing doctors, midwives, and nurses were purposefully sampled and surveyed. Different referral forms were reviewed. The union of data sets from surveys and forms was aggregated and mapped to base patient FHIR resource elements, and extensions were created for data sets not in the core FHIR specification. This study also introduced FHIR and its relation to the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) International Classification of Diseases.

Results

We found many different data elements from the referral forms and survey responses even in urban settings. The resulting FHIR standard profile is published on GitHub for adaptation or adoption as necessary to aid alignment with WHO recommendations. Understanding data sets used in health care and clinical practice for information sharing is crucial in properly standardizing information sharing, particularly during the management of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases. Development organizations and governments can use this methodology and profile to fast-track FHIR standards adoption for paper and electronic information sharing at PHC systems in LMICs.

Conclusions

We presented our methodology for profiling the referral resource crucial for the standardized exchange of new and expectant moms’ information. Using data from frontline providers and mapping to the FHIR profile helped contextualize the standardized profile.

Change Management and Digital Innovations in Hospitals of Five European Countries

The objective of the paper is to evaluate the quality of systemic change management (CHM) and readiness for change in five Central European countries. The secondary goal is to identify trends and upcoming changes in the field of digital innovations in healthcare. The results show that all compared countries (regardless of their historical context) deal with similar CHM challenges with a rather similar degree of success. A questionnaire distributed to hospitals clearly showed that there is still considerable room for improvement in terms of the use of specific CHM tools. A review focused on digital innovations based on the PRISMA statement showed that there are five main directions, namely, data collection and integration, telemedicine, artificial intelligence, electronic medical records, and M-Health. In the hospital environment, there are considerable reservations in applying change management principles, as well as the absence of a systemic approach. The main factors that must be monitored for a successful and sustainable CHM include a clearly defined and widely communicated vision, early engagement of all stakeholders, precisely set rules, adaptation to the local context and culture, provision of a technical base, and a step-by-step implementation with strong feedback.

User-centered design of a scalable, electronic health record-integrated remote symptom monitoring intervention for patients with asthma and providers in primary care

OBJECTIVE

To determine user and electronic health records (EHR) integration requirements for a scalable remote symptom monitoring intervention for asthma patients and their providers.

METHODS

Guided by the Non-Adoption, Abandonment, Scale-up, Spread, and Sustainability (NASSS) framework, we conducted a user-centered design process involving English- and Spanish-speaking patients and providers affiliated with an academic medical center. We conducted a secondary analysis of interview transcripts from our prior study, new design sessions with patients and primary care providers (PCPs), and a survey of PCPs. We determined EHR integration requirements as part of the asthma app design and development process.

RESULTS

Analysis of 26 transcripts (21 patients, 5 providers) from the prior study, 21 new design sessions (15 patients, 6 providers), and survey responses from 55 PCPs (71% of 78) identified requirements. Patient-facing requirements included: 1- or 5-item symptom questionnaires each week, depending on asthma control; option to request a callback; ability to enter notes, triggers, and peak flows; and tips pushed via the app prior to a clinic visit. PCP-facing requirements included a clinician-facing dashboard accessible from the EHR and an EHR inbox message preceding the visit. PCP preferences diverged regarding graphical presentations of patient-reported outcomes (PROs). Nurse-facing requirements included callback requests sent as an EHR inbox message. Requirements were consistent for English- and Spanish-speaking patients. EHR integration required use of custom application programming interfaces (APIs).

CONCLUSION

Using the NASSS framework to guide our user-centered design process, we identified patient and provider requirements for scaling an EHR-integrated remote symptom monitoring intervention in primary care. These requirements met the needs of patients and providers. Additional standards for PRO displays and EHR inbox APIs are needed to facilitate spread.

Towards an optimized security approach to IoT devices with confidential healthcare data exchange

Reliable data exchange and efficient image transfer are currently significant research challenges in health care systems. To incentivize data exchange within the Internet of Things (IoT) framework, we need to ensure data sovereignty by facilitating secure data exchange between trusted parties. The security and reliability of data-sharing infrastructure require a community of trust. Therefore, this paper introduces an encryption frame based on data fragmentation. It also presents a novel, deterministic grey-scale optical encryption scheme based on fundamental mathematics. The objective is to use encryption as the underlying measure to make the data unintelligible while exploiting fragmentation to break down sensitive relationships between attributes. Thus, sensitive data distributed in separate data repositories for decryption and reconstruction using interpolation by knowing polynomial coefficients and personal values from the DBMS Database Management System. Aims also to ensure the secure acquisition of diagnostic images, micrography, and all types of medical imagery based on probabilistic approaches. Visual sharing of confidential medical imageries based on implementing a novel method, where transparencies ≤k - 1 out of n cannot reveal the original image.